A Little Town Called Death
by Rogha
Summary: Western!AU. Soul reckoned that this nowhere town on the edge of the frontier would be the perfect place to hide from his past. And it is almost perfect, if it weren't for the fact that someone won't stop murdering the townsfolk.
1. Prologue & Chapter One

**I'm saying this now, on the 31st of July, the day I opened a doc to write this, that I don't know anything about American History or cowboys and I have almost no intention of googling anything.**

 **Anyway, here's my written contribution to resbang 2017. Can you believe that this is my fifth resbang? Jesus, time flies. This ficwould not exist without the resbang structure, and it wouldn't exist half so good with the imput and inspiration and grammar corrction of soundoffez, marshofsleep and my much beloveed Caitlin, who has no idea why I make her read my resbang every year.**

 **(Hint: It's because I value your opinion.)**

 **Disclaimer: Still not the guy. I'm too tired to google how to spell his name.**

* * *

 **PROLOGUE.**

 **(Shortly Before The Story Commences)**

* * *

"Ain't nothing out past here, boy." He was old and grizzled, a character of note in another story set some twenty odd years earlier. That story wasn't this story though, he was only passing through this tale. "Nothing but Death."

Oddly poetic for a man who'd been a model of stoicism for the entire ride out.

Still, the boy, hereinafter referred to as Soul, tipped his hat to the man and carried on. Soul wasn't the name his mother had given him, but that hardly mattered. She'd be much happier knowing he wasn't dragging the good family name through the dust anyway.

"See you around, Ifan," the man called after him, before turning and heading the other direction.

There was one final town out here on the edge of the reasonably known world, and that was Soul's destination. He had, in his breast pocket, a crumpled telegram advising him to come out immediately.

Rather, he had a crumpled clipping from a newspaper begging for someone to ride out to the last town on the frontier and take up ingainful employment playing the pianoforte in the local saloon. It was described as a hazardous and life-endangering task, and 'the successful applicant would be able to play competently, have a good sense of when to cower for their life, and when to fight for that selfsame life.'

The telegram was the one asking him if he was certain he was the man for the job.

* * *

 **CHAPTER ONE.**

 **(Here Begins The Story.)**

* * *

At first glance the town was just like any of the other towns Soul had passed through on the ride out. At second glance, it was exactly like any of the other towns he'd passed through. It would be a great many more glances before something strange started to shape itself in the town's image, but for the moment, it was more or less any town.

For now, it was a collection of dusty, sunbleached, wooden buildings and compacted dirt roads, all aligning the vanishing point of a clean, fresh painted chapel. There was no heavily travelled trail to indicate that anything of significance might exist beyond the town. A handful of trails wound away from the heart of the town, but as far out as Soul could see, they might only be traversed once or twice a week, if someone could be so inclined to come into town that often.

The only thing that might make a body consider there to be anything unusual about this town, was the name. There, positioned at the boundary, was a sign welcoming Soul to the township of Death.

Soul wasn't certain that this was what the man he'd spoken with in the previous town intended, but the people here must've had a twisted sense of what made a respectable name for a town.

Town on the edge of the frontier seemed far away enough, for now.

The saloon sat tall between two low buildings - the postmasters and a general store wearing bullet holes like a pox - and the customary layer of dust was absent. There were a pair of heavy hocked horses tied up outside of the general store, and Soul was careful to tie Falada up some distance away. She didn't take kindly to strangers, acquaintances, or anyone that wasn't Soul.

It was early in the day, and the saloon was quiet- there was only three old crones playing a slow game of cards in the corner.

"Hello?" Soul called. The crones in the corner glanced up to take his measure, but the card game did not falter for a second. Soul couldn't admit to recognising what they're playing, but there was a heap of valuables piled in the centre, a couple of dice and complicated woven structure of were playing with more than one deck of mismatched cards, and the table was strewn with half-measures of whiskey. "I came to enquire after the notice printed in _The Appeal._ "

A man appeared behind the bar, sharply dressed in the blackest clothes Soul had ever seen outside a picture of the mourning Queen Victoria. He was flanked on either side by a barmaid, the pair of them blonde-haired, sharp-eyed, and mistrustful.

He nodded once towards the general vicinity of the piano, and Soul took that to mean that he was expected to play his prepared audition piece. The wood was scarred, the lacquer chipped off in places, and the ivory was yellow and cracked. It could tell some stories, and it had seen some things, but when Soul ran his fingers up the keys in a scale the notes rang something akin to true, and moved freely.

He cracked his knuckles sharply and began to play.

The crones in the corner put down their cards to listen.

It was easy to get enraptured in playing, to become so wrapped up in the song and the notes and the tune and the dance of his fingers. It was easy to forget that he can pull others in, numb them until they forgot how to do everything but listen.

He stopped abruptly, cutting the song off at its climax.

The crones were playing cards again, the same inscrutable, complicated game, but one of them flipped him a coin without looking up. It spun easily through the air, the silver flashing in the light, and Soul snatched it out of the air without any much difficulty. It was so hot that he near enough dropped it again, the metal burning against his fingertips, and there was a hole punched clear through it.

Must've been the product of some sharpshooter or another's trick shot.

He stuffed the coin in his pocket, shaking his hand to cool it down again and looked back up at the barkeep.

"You've got the job," he said. "Now, about payment -"

"-Ain't much in the way of cash other than what folks is inclined to give you," the taller barmaid cut him off. "But there's bed and board, and a fair division of what's left over after that."

"And there's not much trouble around these parts!" the other barmaid leaned over the bar to get a good look at Soul. "I'm Patti, this here is Liz, and folks 'round here call Mistah Bossy-Britches Kidd."

"Call me Soul."

"Alrighty Mistah Soul, you'll like it here," Patti did most of the talking around here it seemed, whether the others wanted her to or not. "It's a real decent place, I swear."

Soul remembered the notice in the paper, and decided to ask a question.

"What happened to the last pianist?"

"Oh, Hiro, that guy couldn't tell a piano music from a way-bill-"

"Patti-" Kidd warned. "We do not speak ill of the dead under this roof."

"He was about as good at piano playing as one-armed man with a mallet, Kidd," Patti said. "I ain't gonna whitewash him just cause he upped and got hisself killed."

"Killed?" Soul ventured, nervously.

"You're as a bad as long-tailed cat in a room of rockers," Liz sighed and shook her head. "Hiro was found a mile or so outside the town, ripped to more pieces than a cuckold's apology letter and spread 'round for a carrion feast."

"Never mind all that," Patti waved Liz away, smiling, "Let's get you settled in, it's been a long journey!"

* * *

Soul was duly shown his accommodation, which was nothing to write home about. He had no intention of writing home, but even if he did, he wasn't going to mention the bare floorboards and the faded patchwork quilt. It'd serve the purpose of being a roof over his head and a bed under it, and he couldn't ask for much more.

He moved Falada out to a small pasture out back where she stood apart from the other residents, a horse and an ass, respectively. She didn't seem too impressed by the new living arrangements and Soul was in the middle of trying to placate her with a windfall apple when Patti interrupted to give Soul a tour of the local attractions, of which there were remarkably few, and to acquaint him with the locals.

The proprietors of the General Store were a bespectacled man named after an institution of higher learning in Great Britain, and his silent companion.

"Afternoon fellas!" said Patti, leaning up on the counter to impart her goodwill. "I'm just showing the newcomer around."

"He any better than the last fella?"

"He's real good," Patti bragged, "Them old ladies put down their cards for a minute or two to lissen."

"Patti, you were seeing things. Those old biddies don't stop playing for nothing or nobody."

"I'm telling you they put down their damn cards - look, Ta even gave him a tip."

Soul pulled out the coin when Patti waved at him with some urgency. He didn't quite understand the significance of the fact, but it shut the bullheaded shopkeep right up. By name and by nature, this Ox fellow.

Ox's silent companion, a man who went by the name of Harvar and whose eyes were hidden by the low brim and deep shadow of his hat, whistled long and low.

A pair of women with actual business bustled in, and one of them decided to cut past Patti brusquely, while the other stayed behind in order to apologise profusely for the first.

"I'm always telling Kim not to - " behind her, the first woman was smiling at Ox, who seemed to be struggling to keep his eyes away from the generous amount of bosom she had on display.

"I've been here long enough to pay our Kim no mind," Patti said, brushing off the slight. "Anyhow, this here's Soul, our new piano man, and Soul, this's Jac-quill-een, our midwife."

"Jackie," she corrected. There didn't seem much in the way of formalities in this town, Soul thought, and it didn't escaped his notice how Patti already abandoned the 'Mistah'. She shook his hand firmly. "Nice to meet you."

She was dressed neatly, not a hair out of place, a complete contrast to the wild girl who'd blown in past them. Soul had played more than enough venues of ill-repute to know how Kim makes her living, rouged and stained like she -

"And that's Kim," Patti said, pointing shamelessly. "She's the town apothecary."

That, Soul would never confess, had not been his first guess.

"There's nothing our Kim can't manage to put to rights," Jackie gushed. "So don't bother your fanny going to see that old sawbones up on the ridge for anything more'n getting your death certificate signed."

"Doctor Stein is - " Patti started, before she was interrupted by swollen belly accompanied by a deep voice. Had word gotten out that there was some new shiny bauble in the shape of a music man to be looked at? Or was the General Store just the place to be around town?

"Speak of the devil and he shall appear," said the deep voice, and then; "Ow," because the right arm of the body attached to the swollen belly had smacked him.

"Doctor Stein! I'm so sorry!" said Jackie, wheeling away, apologetic. She seemed to make more by the way of apologies than conversation. "I didn't -"

"Of course you did, Jacqueline, but you were quite right," Doctor Stein was tall, taller even than Soul, who had become accustomed to being the tallest person in the vicinity and Soul was unnerved by this fact. "I was not blessed with Kim's healing touch."

"You have other talents!" said the woman attached to the belly. She wore an eye-patch, embroidered with some manner of design, and her hair fell in the golden blonde ringlets all the ladies at home struggled to achieve. She ran a hand over the belly, so enormous it appeared almost a whole character of its own, full of baby. "Oh? Who's this, Patti?"

Soul resigned himself to being introduced again, something he found taxing enough. This time, Patti cheerfully introduced him to Doctor Stein and his wife Marie, whose strong- gripped handshake left him no doubt in believing that she was the town blacksmith.

"Although," she said, patting the belly with great affection. "I'm afraid if you need any work done, you'll have to wait."

What kind of town was Death? Soul was deep in thought as he and Patti left the shop, squeezing out past the crowded space.

And it wasn't just the women, free-willed and independent, working laborious, respected jobs, instead of waiting impatiently to be married or working domestically. Soul had been through near enough every town in the country it seemed, and most of them seemed to adopt the mantra of "we don't take kindly to strangers around here, boy," punctuated with the sharp cock of a rifle. Death, despite its unwholesome name, appeared to be populated by people who seemed genuine in their happiness to make his acquaintance.

"Town goes by the name of Death, can't be altogether too fussy about its residents," Patti said, answering a question Soul hadn't even begun to think to ask. "There's a few more people you might benefit from meeting, but there's time enough for that after you meet our own personal Chief Justice."

She nodded at the man stumbling home drunk out of what Soul assumed to be the town brothel. He made this assumption based on the sign proclaiming the building to be _The Dovecote,_ and the fact that the drunk was stained around the face and neck with the bright red of carmine dye. The colour matched the rosy lips of the woman cheerfully waving him on his way.

"Afternoon Sheriff."

He tipped his at the barmaid sluggishly, before trudging down towards the Sheriff's office.

"Him?"

"Oh no," Patti laughed at his apparent idiocy. "Her daddy may be the sheriff, boy, but our Miss Albarn's the law."

Patti directed him towards that beautiful, clean, fresh painted chapel.

"She's in there."

"Aren't you coming?" Soul asked.

"Oh, I can't set foot on consecrated ground," Patti laughed, brushing him off like she had never heard anything quite so stupid.

"Why not?"

"I'm one of them filthy heretics you've heard s'much about." Patti said, shoving him through the gate. "Say hello to our Kidd's daddy."

* * *

It was quiet past the gate, as if the town wasn't just outside the holy ground. Built all around it, in fact, spiralling out into the harsh landscape. Patti was already gone when he turned round, having seemed turned tail and ran for the safety of the saloon, so he walked up to the church doors alone.

They opened quietly, and shut quietly too, but the muffled noise still made the woman trying to pry open a coffin resting in front of the altar start. She turned quickly, her skirts swirling around her legs.

"Preacher!" She turned, some excuse or another ready to fall off her tongue. She was red faced with the shame of being caught red handed. "Oh."

"Miss Albarn?" Soul asked, his hat clutched in his hands. His mother didn't raise him a lot of things, but she impress upon him that men do not wear hats indoors. "I was told you would be here."

"And here I am," Miss Albarn shifted her weight in order to conceal the claw hammer she was using to remove the long nails holding the lid closed. "Who're you?"

"Soul."

"Soul?" Maka said. "Got a last name to go with that?"

"Eh…" _Evans. "_ Eater."

"Well then, Mr. Eater -" Miss Albarn smiled, and it was a wicked thing in the house of God, "Watch the door while I finish my business. Tell me if you spot the preacher."

Soul turned his back on the sounds of the wood cracking under the strain of the claw hammer, and a string of quiet curses, resigning himself to the position of lookout. There was a nice piano in the corner, much newer and cleaner than the one in the saloon, but without as much character. He stayed there, tuning his senses diligently outwards, until a great clatter indicated to him that the lid was, in fact, off.

He turned then, and headed past the well oiled pews to investigate what was in this coffin that needed so desperately to be opened up for a look-see. Miss Albarn was standing over it arms akimbo, wondering where exactly to begin rooting through the contents.

And the contents - Soul thought he was a man with a strong stomach, but this was something else entirely. This was the limited remains of his predecessor, if he was a gambling man. He'd best ask though, assumptions are perilous things. He's a quick study, what can he say?

"This Hiro?"

"Sure is," said Miss Albarn cheerfully, up to her elbows in sun-dried entrails. She patted what was let of the blonde hair on his head. "He was a damn mail-order cowboy and a gadabout to boot, but he didn't mean any harm by it."

Soul didn't know what that meant, but he had learned the hard way it was better that people think you were dumb, rather than to open your mouth and remove all doubt. He had a reputation as a blow in to protect.

"What are you looking for?" He asked instead, nodding down at the corpse.

"Something - you're new around here, but Hiro wasn't keen to venture far from town," Miss Albarn shifting through the handfuls or remains mixed with dirt. "He didn't go out there of his own free will, and I mean to find what possessed him to do so."

"Was he dead when he got out there -"

"Nah," Miss Albarn looked like she wished it was that easy. "No drag marks."

"What in damnation is going on here?"

"It appears that the preacher has arrived -" Soul belatedly warned Miss Albarn.

"Maka Albarn you did not come into the house of our Lord to disrupt the final rest of Hiro," the preacher was tall and imposing, with hollow cheeks and deep eye sockets, like his skin was pulled taut over his skull. "And I know you are not corrupting the newest member of our humble congregation - a Mr. Evans?"

"Eater. Soul Eater," Soul introduced himself quickly, eager to steer the conversation away from the body behind him.

"Well, that is a strange name."

"I'm the new pianist in the saloon -"

"Kidd's?" the preacher rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "You're working with my boy?"

Soul nodded, too scared to open his mouth. The preacher frowned thoughtfully, before absently waving them both out. Miss Albarn stooped to grab her hammer, but Soul gripped her arm and pulled her along before she could draw too much attention to them both. The hammer was left abandoned on the floor, despite her complaints.

He wasn't here to draw attention to himself or anyone else for that matter.

Once they were outside the church grounds, Soul dropped Miss Albarn's bare hand like it had scalded him. To act so familiar with an unmarried woman to whom he was barely acquainted!

"My apologies-" he stopped. This was no place for his gentlemanly upbringing and manners. He reddened, hoping she wouldn't notice the slip.

She looked at him curiously, her oddly coloured, greenish eyes boring into him.

Coward that he was, he turned tail and fled for the safety of the saloon without another word.

* * *

 **If you liked this, please R &R.**


	2. Chapter Two

**CHAPTER TWO.**

 **(Here Continues The Story.)**

* * *

He kept his first coin, the gold one with the hole bored right through the centre of it, strung on leather cord around his neck. Even if he thought he could get something for it, Soul wanted to hang onto it. He couldn't rightly say why he wanted to, but fortunately no one ever thought to ask.

He had received a number of coins since then, whenever it so happened that people were drunk enough to part with a coin or two. Most of them were American dollars, but like the gold one, a few strange and foreign coins were mixed in.

He kept those, the ones from far away ports, adding them to the cord around his neck as best he could - threading the cord through a round bronze piece with a square punched out of its centre, boring holes in an irregular silver rectangle and a copper square.

They hit against each other as he walked, clinking softly as he went about his business. He was getting to fit right into this town, where he found the people to be friendly but not over curious as to his motivations to arriving in the town. And by the by, anyone who was curious about the newcomer settled down when there was not much to know.

Soul was a man of mystery, but people liked their men of mystery to fit a certain image, and he did not fit it. Some people took a notion to approaching his horse, and more than a few of them left Falada nursing purple bruises.

She and he both were left much alone after that, and Soul took to riding out with her every morning, as early as he could stomach getting up after at late night entertaining the patrons.

And so life went on.

Soul took great pains to avoid Miss Albarn after the incident in the church, even though he heard no more about it. That said, even if there had been more about it to hear, Soul, although beginning to form close acquaintances in the little town, could not rightly say that he was inducted into the circle of those who gossiped and chattered around town about what went on behind closed doors.

She was easy to avoid in the day, caught up in running the schoolhouse and picking up where the Sheriff left off, and even easier to avoid at night, where she holed up somewhere her Daddy was unlikely to be found.

Of course it would make sense that the next time he encountered her, some weeks after their first not entirely successful meeting, it was in the wake of a second grisly death.

* * *

Soul found him, out on a ride with Falada. He liked to ride Falada out the outskirts of town, looping slowly back to the saloon, speaking softly with her. She was calmer there, away from the noise of the town, and away from someone to start a fight with. He was out on one such ride when he came across the body.

To tell the tale from its beginning, which I am not wont to do, he came across a murder of crows clustered around something, squawking and squabbling. Soul was a curious enough man to wade through the chaos to see what on earth could cause such a frenzy, swinging his leg over and climbing down off Falada to see what all this fuss was about. Something was tugging at his stomach, a gut feeling he'd soon regret. He nudged the squabbling birds out of the way, shooing them, but he didn't cut an intimidating enough figure to scare them much farther than a foot away.

It was, as the eagle eyed reader may have ascertained, a human corpse, the body of one Akane Hoshi. His punctured eyes stared up at him, dried blood crusting his cheeks like tears. Well, it was as much of a body as Hiro has been a body. Soul couldn't tell what killed him, or what hurt had been done before the birds had set their beady eyes on him. He was ripped apart, shredded and torn to pieces with the carrion birds fighting over the meat and tugging at his flesh, pulling pieces off, tearing morsels away and gobbling them down and...

Soul threw up in the dirt, tasting bile, sick to his stomach at the sight of a good man torn open like that. He probably would've thrown up at the sight of a bad man torn up like that, strewn around like wedding rice. Falada sidestepped, dodging Soul's breakfast. She pushed her nose into his shoulder in a rare gesture of compassion, if he was to guess.

Soul wouldn't've recognized him, only he was wearing the same clothes as the night before - a nicer suit than most of town had put together, if getting a little shiny at the knees. Akane was a devout soul, went to the church because he believed in it, really believed in it. Soul swung his leg up to climb on Falada, speaking softly to her as if this was no different to any other ride. He scrubbed his mouth as clean as he could, but it still tasted of acid and he still felt all kinds of wrong as he urged Falada to turn and head back into town.

Someone had to tell the Sheriff.

* * *

He was in the stable, or what passed for a stable, talking softly to Falada, who was still a little spooked by the encounter, or perhaps knew there was some mileage to be gotten out of this. Soul didn't know, she was a very clever horse. Much cleverer than he suspected any horse had a right to be.

At any rate a man was dead and a horse was demanding attention, and he gave to her his fullest attention, so much so that when Miss Albarn entered the stable and spoke to him, it took him some minutes to notice her presence.

Some minutes, and a lot of pointed throat clearing on the behalf of Miss Albarn.

"Miss Albarn!" He spluttered, startled by what appeared to be her sudden appearance. He glanced around, looking to see if there was some quick escape available to him. No such luck.

"Mr. Eater," she said quietly, offering him a delicate cup of bone china, probably one of the most expensive items for miles around. Falada didn't count as an item, though Soul recalled her as being fairly expensive. Or at least, she had cost his parents a significant sum of money. "My Papa told me you weren't doing so well with the discovery. I came right over."

Soul looked at her, and she huffed.

"Alright," she admitted. "I came right over after I went out to have a look at Akane."

"That sounds more like you."

He took the cup, and it smelled strong and unfamiliar. The brew was yellowish in colour, and he sipped it cautiously.

The taste was unfamiliar but not unpleasant, and he continue to drink it, holding the cup gently in his hands.

"It's a ginger tea," Maka explained. "To settle your stomach."

"You are aware of my affliction, then?"

"I don't think throwing up at the sight of of a dismembered corpse counts as an affliction."

"And you are quite sure about that, Miss Albarn?" Soul asked hopefully.

"Quite sure," she said. "But I have yet to receive my medical license -"

"Are you planning on studying to be a doctor?"

"No, no," she blushed. "I thought about it for a while, but I think I may be turning out like my Papa after all."

Soul looked at her quizzically - it was no secret that Miss Albarn detested her father intensely, and she was loathe to admit to any commonalities between them.

"I did not, Mr. Eater, lick my knack for solving puzzles up off of the ground," she said. "And my somewhat dogged determination, well I doubt it came from my Mama, or she might still be here."

"Oh, I'm sorry - when did she pass?"

"She isn't dead, Mr. Eater, but she is long gone and I am beginning to think she never had any intention of staying."

Soul didn't know what to say to that, so he took another long sip of tea instead.

Falada leaned over to smell it, but turned her nose up in disgust.

"Don't be rude," Soul said reflexively. Then, remembering Miss Albarn: "Not you, Falada."

"I suspected as much," she said, and smiled. She was in possession of the sort of smile that brightened up an entire room, and was just a little hard to look at. She leaned over to pat Falada gently on the nose.

"Don't!" Soul warned, reaching out to stop her. Falada cautiously nuzzled into the contact.

"She's a big sweetheart, she'd never -" Maka pulled her hand back quickly to avoid Falada's sudden change of heart and also, her teeth.

Soul pushed Falada's nose away from where she stretched out to seek human flesh. She's tasted blood before, and she was ready to taste it again.

"She's beautiful," Maka nodded at Falada. "How long've you two been together?"

"Since she was a foal - hauled her into this world kicking and screaming myself," he smiled. It had all seemed like a huge illicit adventure at the time, being up late, the high stakes andthe mess and the stable master happy enough to have a helping hand instead of insisting on him going to back to bed. "First order of business was to give me a hell of a black eye."

Falada whinnied like she could remember it, and that remembering it was bringing her great joy. Soul wasn't inclined to argue with an seventeen and a half hand horse.

"Second order of business was," Soul lowered his voice as if to prevent Falada being upset by what he said next. "Well, Falada's mother started and ended her brooding career with her."

His mother had been so angry, infuriated at the loss of her investment - Anserinae had pedigree, a line that stretched back to Diomedes and a price tag to match. She was supposed to be matched with some stud of equal value to create some kind of super horse… but Anserinae and a big old draft horse who worked the fields named Broomtail had other plans.

The stable master called all the working horses some visual descriptor or another. Grulla and Flaxey, That Ol' Brown Dun, all spoken in the gruff manner if someone who wanted to pretend they didn't care as much as they did. And Broomtail, a beast of a horse. 20 hands at least, and seeming like the top of the world when Soul was a kid.

"She was too big," Soul said, scratching between Falada's ears. "I raised her after that."

Who else would? The stable master was busy, and Falada wasn't worth anything.

"You did a great job," Maka said dryly. "She's got them real ladylike manners."

"Did you just insult my horse?"

* * *

News of the death spread quickly, and the circumstances of the death were so uncannily similar to that of Hiro's that everyone was forced to reconsider the classification of such as an unfortunate accident involving extremely wild animals.

The absence of Akane would not felt widely, but he had enough people who saw him him regularly enough to miss him, and enough people to shed tears when they learned of his tragic and untimely end.

And it was both tragic and untimely, Soul could tell. Akane Hoshi did not seem like a man in a great hurry to die - he was serious, yes, but he never needed drink to crack a smile. He tossed Soul the odd coin now and then, especially when Soul played something a little more classical than the other patrons preferred.

He kept the last coin Akane gave him. It was still in his pocket, real lonely with all the nothing else he'd got last night. Bored a hole in it and strung it on the cord next to the other, instead of spending it on a portion of lamp oil that wouldn't last all that long anyway.

* * *

Despite Sheriff Albarn's best attempts and Miss Albarn's significantly better attempts, someone was determined to violently murder people, and an enforced curfew and sharp eyed schoolteacher weren't going to stop them.

Especially since there were out of towners to be had, people who didn't know of the murders or the violence to which they were undertaken.

Miss Azusa was a friend of Mrs. Stein's, and was supposed to be visiting from the next town over to see her dear friend before she undertook childbirth. As it turned out two things were not in her favor on this journey. First and foremost Marie, who would be terribly annoyed to find that Soul had called her Mrs. Stein, gave birth to a squalling baby girl who was swiftly swaddled and named Hanora. She had her mother's golden hair and her father's unfortunate predisposition to appearing somewhat like a corpse. And secondly, perhaps of somewhat more significance to the tale, Miss Asuza never arrived. Well, to tell the whole truth, she did arrive, she herself was the thing that was not whole upon arrival.

Not that there was any of her missing, or not much by any rate. Not compared to Hiro, anyway, who'd been waiting to be found long enough that the critters had decided to seize a free lunch. To tell a long story short after the long telling of it, she was in pieces, although no pieces were reported missing, by the good doctor. He smiled all the day while he worked, and whether could be attributed to the birth of his first child or his terrifying fascination with the macabre, there was no one willing to speculate.

Her horse was gone, bolted homewards, but her few valuables remained. Hiro had no valuables of note to be pilfered, something Soul could believe, holding as he did Hiro's former position, made available by his untimely demise. At that time, nobody had paid that any mind. It was of note at this time that these few items had been left. Not much really - some good spectacles and a nice rifle, a handful of fresh minted coins - all with the body, or at least in at the centre of the radiating parts of the body, when they could've been taken for the murderer's own personal gain.

Miss Albarn told Soul all of this in an attempt to convince him to help her get a good look at the body as it were, painstaking arranged in the coffin. Dr. Stein didn't have much in the way of work, and putting Miss Azusa back together had been something like work, except for the part where you might get paid. Despite the sawbones' valiant efforts, it was to be a closed coffin ceremony, and her trusty claw foot hammer dangled from her fingers.

He did not ask how she had reacquired the hammer, although he doubted very sincerely that the preacher had just been so kind as to simply hand it over.

Soul was not convinced she even needed his help, nor that he could prove to be any great help even if she did need it. But she smiled at him, so he found himself agreeing to her harebrained plot before his brain could quite catch up with his ricocheting heart.

"How may I be of assistance?" Soul asked, aiming for charming and landing somewhere around endearing.

"I need you to distract everyone so that I can get a look at Azusa!"

"What in damnation makes you think I can do that?"

"You don't intend to make me say it, do you?"

"Say what, Miss Albarn?" Soul looked her her the eye, genuinely uncertain as to what she could possibly mean.

She reddened, and she huffed, and she even stomped her foot, but Soul did not look away even as she cast her gaze to the side and gestured up and down him.

"You're distracting, Mr. Eater, by nature."

It was only fair that Soul would turn a deep shade of red in response to that. After all, what could a man possibly say to that?

She shooed him away, and Soul supposed that this meant he ought to go be 'distracting' elsewhere, ideally where the people moving Miss Azusa might experience its full effects.

And Soul, wondering as he might what on earth he did to be so distracting, did not know where to begin.

Soul turned away on the heel of his boot towards the saloon, figuring he may as well use the gift he paid for so dearly for something worthwhile, The saloon was about as empty as it normally was this time of the afternoon, with the exception of the old sisters in the corner, playing their cards as they always did.

One of them, Ta Goodwin, flashed her eyes at him, glancing up from the cards to nod at him, once. She'd given him the coin, and he suspected that she was soft on him. One of the others, Na, huffed and Ma just turned a card, focused as intently on the game as ever.

The piano seemed to hum under his fingertips, having finally warmed up to him. She was a beat up, mistrustful old beast but she was content to allow Soul coax music out of her. It didn't hurt that he'd tuned her up, but that didn't mean it helped either. It was like the first day he'd met her again, running his fingers in an arpeggio while his hand searched for the sound, before letting go.

Music like this could call people in off the street.

Music like this found people and made them lost.

Musc like this was incredibly distracting.

He wasn't inclined to let himself go like this very often, fingers pounding on the keys, his hands dancing and his whole body taunt with effort. He figured it as the kind of thing that might draw the attention of those he might prefer if their attention was drawn elsewhere. But Miss Albarn had asked him, and she was hard to say no to.

He heard the floorboards creak as folks wandered in off the road to better hear him, but he didn't look up to see if he had pulled in the two strapping young men who'd come out to draw the remains of the late Azusa home.

He just played, and kept playing until the song was done.

* * *

 **Please consider leaving a reveiw.**


	3. Chapter Three

**CHAPTER THREE.**

 **(The Story Starts To Pick Up.)**

* * *

The man known as Mosquito was well respected, if in no way well-liked. He had been found, like Hiro and Azusa, just outside the town boundary, torn to pieces and strewn about in no particular manner. It was if the killer had ripped him apart in search of something deep inside his body. Although what that was, Soul could not say, and more importantly, according to Doctor Stein's casual glance around the scene - "Nothing much is missing."

And then:

"I appreciate you not vomiting on the crime scene this time, Eater."

"Don't mention it."

And Soul knew all of this because he was the one who had stumbled across the dismembered corpse of the dislikeable town miser, when heading out on an early morning ride with Falada. He had to at least try and start avoiding the dead bodies that appeared to be strewn around the outskirts of this town like tumbleweeds. And apparently this made him a person of interest in the four murders, one of which he can admit he directly benefited from.

He could see where Sheriff Albarn was coming from - he had found two of the bodies, the first body's, poor Hiro's, untimely demise had opened up a job for a transient stranger who just happened to be passing through the town at the time. He couldn't think of anything that might connect him to Azusa, but if he were a man on a murder spree he supposed he might have just considered her a lucky break.

Yes, he could absolutely understand why some people might find that incredibly suspicious, and that simply saying that he did not murder four people might not hold too much water around here. But, and he would appreciate if everyone knew this, he did not kill anyone.

So not only did he see all this happening, he saw all of it happening while under the vigilant glare of Sheriff Albarn, who, once sobered and reasonably separated from anyone in a skirt was not wholly incompetent.

This, for some reason or another Soul would rather not dwell on, included his own daughter. Upon sighting her striding across the murder scene, the good Sheriff's legs went from under him. She stepped over him with a practised callousness.

"Mr. Eater, what are you doing here!?" Miss Albarn exclaimed, and her father traded the thin veneer of competence and respectability in order to cling to her skirts and begin sobbing. She ignored him coldly, and didn't allow herself to be distracted from the matter at hand.

"Good day to you too, Miss Albarn," Soul said, tipping his hat. "I am to be accused of murder presently, I imagine."

"Oh, are you really?" Miss Albarn was surprised. "What on earth makes you think so?"

"Yes," Soul nodded. "Doesn't look good when you stumble upon the eviscerated corpse of a fellow who was rude to you. Would you look after my Falada?"

Falada, who had been seized and tied up apart from the other horses, hated any person who wasn't Soul bitterly, and she was only tenuously fond of him, but there was no one else who he could ask in the immediate vicinity. He would have to ask Falada very nicely to go with Maka, as she had already tried to bite anyone in reach.

Mosquito was rude to everyone, but he had been rude to Soul very recently, and apparently that made a significant difference in likeliness to have been murdered by.

Soul wouldn't be lying if he said that Mosquito's barb hadn't injured him deeply and personally, and he was lying when he'd replied to Sheriff Albarn's earlier line of inquiry with: "I took no offense, as Mr. Mosquito had intended none."

What Mr. Mosquito had said - "I'm sure whatever resided in that hole you crawled out of considered this music, but I implore you to widen your exceedingly narrow range," - was very much intended to cause offense, but Soul didn't want to seem like the kind of person who mulled over these things as they tore at the very core of his personhood and sought violent retribution on the perpetrator. He was just deeply wounded by the comment, that was all.

Immediately after the utterance, Miss Liz had, without looking up from where she gathering up a handful of empty tumblers, five of them pinched together in one hand, shot right through Mosquito's ridiculous and over-priced hat and asked him to leave. Soul had a inkling he was supposed to be ashamed that a woman had defended his honour, but he was too pleased that someone would even consider leaping to his defense to care about such things.

He was learning that this town was not bound by the high society rules he had left behind. He found it refreshing, and pleasant, although he often found himself longing for the large, silent houses or the simple luxury of distance between him and the rest of the world.

Mosquito's passing also helped to soften the blow somewhat.

"Oh, he's rude to everyone," Miss Albarn said dismissively, and then, with absolute conviction: "I don't think you did it."

"Why not?"

"You damn near lost your lunch into poor Hiro's coffin," Miss Albarn's eyes sparked when she smiled reassuringly at him. "And everyone knows that it was you who threw up on-"

"You don't have to - " Soul was saddened to recall that nobody had spared him the indignity of the entire town knowing that he had thrown up at the sight of Akane.

"There's no way my Papa'll arrest you-" Maka began, but her father detached himself from her hemline and straightened, feigning a semblance of dignity.

"Mr. Eater, I am placing you under arrest for the murders of Mr. Hiro Bolton, Mr. Akane Hoshi and Mr. Moscol Tito and the murder of Miss Azusa Yumi," Sheriff Albarn produced a set of manacles from inside his vest. "Get away from my Maka."

* * *

The Jailhouse was just about what he expected a jailhouse to be, in a small town with no real call for a jailhouse. It was dry and clean, but with an underlying smell of vomit that told Soul it was mostly used to dry out drunks for a day or two.

It would be remiss to say that he'd spent a night in such a place before, because despite everything, Soul was a law abiding man in most places. Especially in places such as these, where the law was both reasonable and somewhat lenient.

Not mention, but The Law had also insisted he wasn't a murderer and promised not to speak to her father ever again. Soul wasn't entirely sure if that was because Miss Albarn was passingly fond of him, or that her deep sense of moral justice was highly offended by the very notion of an innocent man in jail.

It was most likely the second one.

But here he was, full certain that the penalty for this most unfortunate of coincidences that led him languishing in this not wholly unpleasant jail cell would result in his death. By hanging, he suspected. And his death by hanging would mean that all his running and hiding wouldn't mean shit, because he'd be dead and if he was dead and doomed to hellfire and damnation he might as well just have stayed at home and died and been doomed to hellfire and damnation there instead.

Hopefully, Miss Albarn would somehow miraculously prove his innocence or charm her father into letting him go free, otherwise he was not looking forward to what happened next.

Being strung up like a two bit common criminal, that was what happened next.

He was just settling himself into what couldn't possibly be a good night's sleep when he heard a whisper, tugging at the edge of his ears, too faint and far away to make out any of the words. Like the pull of wind through skeleton bare winter trees, except that there wasn't a tree to be found for miles around.

This was a scrubby little town in the middle of a desert, clinging to something akin to prosperity by the tips of its fingers.

" _My blood is black."_

It was getting closer, and Soul rolled off the bench and stumbled to his feet. He twisted, searching for the source of the voice.

" _My blood is black."_

There it was again, accompanied this time by the slow squeal of something sharp being drawn across something hard.

It was whispering all around him, an insidious voice like one summoned from the very deepest, darkest parts of his own soul. Only he'd been injured enough to know that his blood ran red still.

And still it circled, filling the space and him.

" _My blood is black."_

Soul clutched at his necklace of coins, the only thing something like a weapon he had to hand, and even then, not very much like a weapon. His hand settled on the big golden coin, the one punched clean through by a trick shot.

The one the old crone had stopped playing the interminable card game to listen. He prayed to any god who might listen, not that he suspected one might be inclined to after what he did, and he raised the coin to his eye.

Like stepping out of shadow and into the cell, a sickly skinny creature appeared. Their bones had the look of something easy to snap, and their tendons protruded. Their hair fell in matted tangles over their eyes and they were dragging behind them a sword that squealed against the cold stone floor of the cell.

" _My blood is black."_

Soul stumbled away from the creature, something like human but far enough away from it to be of immediate concern. There was a distant darkness around the edges of his vision.

" _This one, he sees me,"_ the voice said, but the creature's mouth didn't move. " _The Old Ones, they gave him a gift."_

Soul fell to his knees, but he clutched the coin in his shaking hand still. His palms were slick and his breathing was quick and panicked. There was a tightness in his chest, like something was squeezing his lungs.

" _Oh no,"_ the creature stopped. " _I don't know how to deal with this."_

Soul couldn't find his voice to ask what _this_ was, and it seemed to be in increasingly short supply. He suspected that the wisest course of action was simply to not say anything at all. After all, they seemed to be hesitant to do anything when faced with him or this or whatever unseen circumstance seemed to be puzzling the creature.

" _There's something wrong with his soul,"_ the creature mused, laboriously pondering over the problem before them. " _If I kill him -"_

"You'd, you'd be wasting your time -" his voice was quiet and gasping, there wasn't enough air to make it louder.

" _He's talking to me - I don't know how, I don't know how to deal with that!"_

"Someone's already laid claim over my soul."

The creature turned and looked at him, staring right through the hole in the coin, looking right at him, and at his forfeit soul. Their hair fell back to reveal pale, silvery eyes that glowed in the darkness of the cell.

They moved their hand flippantly, and Soul was raised to his feet, pulled up just too high by some invisible noose tightening around his throat, the tips of his toes scrabbling to find purchase on the floor. He clawed at his neck with his free hand, but there was nothing there apart from his necklace. The coins were chill against his throat as he held the golden one to his eye.

When the creature spoke again, it was no longer the high and thin, sing-song voice of a child. It was coarse and rasping, reverberating deeply and it grated on his skin rather than crawled.

" _Who?"_

Soul's stomach turned at the idea of naming the demon to whom he owed a debt. A debt he was currently attempting to welch on to the best of his ability.

He shook his head mutely.

He was a fool to do what he'd done, but he wasn't stupid enough to say a name aloud. Names held a lot of power.

" _How?"_

"I struck a bargain," Soul started, his voice suddenly steadier, though the tightness in his chest lingered and the invisible noose tightened and the air was still far too thin. "Made a deal."

" _What deal?"_

"The piano," Soul said. "Ten good years before he'd come to call, ten years afore he'd come to collect my soul, ten years I'd be a master pianist."

" _When?_ "

When? What did when mean? When'd he make the deal? When was he due to pay to pay up? When was he past due to pay up?

" _When?"_ The rasping voice asked again, more insistently.

"A year ago - my soul was due in hell just about this time last year -"

" _I don't know how to deal with this -"_ the thin, high voice was back, and the rasping voice attempted to placate it.

" _Another, we'll find another."_

The thin voice must have agreed that it was better to find someone else than deal with the less than ideal conditions and availability that came hand in hand with his. They turned, the blade scraping in the stone as they left, passing through the walls of his cell.

Soul fell to his hands and knees, gasping and breathing air that was suddenly so easily gained.

By no means did everything suddenly fall into place or become clear to Soul, but one thing most certainly was immediately clarified - or perhaps three things, depending on your count.

The creature was the murderer, it was after souls, and if it could not kill Soul for his own soul it would resign itself to seeking out another victim.

He offered his voice to the world, yelling out for anyone's attention so that someone might be spared that terrible fate, shouting and roaring for anyone to listen.

And when no one did, when his voice cracked out from under him and he could only rasp as the sun crept in through the window, he whispered.

Soul didn't have much left to bargain with, but he prayed that whoever was about to die because he was not suffice would not suffer overmuch.

He did not expect to be granted this small mercy.

* * *

He was still praying when Sheriff Albarn showed up, rattling his keys and looking down on him.

"Heard you screeching like the banshee of the old country in the night," Sheriff Albarn said, which it seemed like he may have been rehearsing. He noticed the praying then. "Huh, didn't take you for a religious man. Trying to save your soul?"

Soul wasn't much for irony, but he knew it when it interrupted him praying. He snorted, a chuff of laughter escaping.

"You here to let me out?" Soul asked instead of answering.

"Not unless you have some evidence that turned up in the night as to why it wasn't you who killed those people."

Soul didn't think 'actual murderer who is a demon came a'callin' last night through the walls' would make him sound anything other than a complete lunatic. So he decided not to mention that and said instead:

"No, but I was hoping you realized I didn't kill them."

"Nice try." The Sheriff frowned deeply. "How'd these scratch marks get here?"

A long narrow gouge was carved out of the stone.

"D'you do this?" Sheriff Albarn asked fiercely. "D'you mark up my nice clean floor?"

"What? No," Soul frowned, "Look, it goes out of the cell, way past further than I can reach."

Then Sheriff Albarn left Soul to stew.

* * *

Soul didn't expect that Sheriff Albarn would continue to allow his daughter to be corrupted by his influence for very much longer, so he really wasn't expecting her to call in. Especially since he was confidant she had found some evidence that he'd committed the murders.

He hadn't, but that was just his luck.

"Mr. Eater!" Miss Albarn burst into the jailhouse, looking rather flushed.

"Miss Albarn!" Soul sprang to his feet, eager not to appear ill-mannered despite his poor night's sleep and very reasonable cause to be ill-tempered. "It's lovely to see you."

She didn't say anything for a minute, so Soul took the liberty of filling the gap.

"How's Falada?"

"She hates me with the fire of a thousand suns and misses you something awful," Miss Albarn said. "She's very upset by your absence. She won't eat a single thing."

"Really? Have you tried pouring a mug of John Barleycorn over her oats?"

"She likes beer?"

"Most horses do," Soul shrugged. "'S the hops."

"I didn't know that," Miss Albarn was frozen by this revelation for moment.

"Any joy on proving I didn't kill anybody?"

Her silence was telling, along not quite as telling, perhaps, as the outburst that followed it.

"Of course, no one who knows you believes you did it - and everyone who knows Papa knows that he's letting our… our… " she stamped her foot and waved her hand between them instead of finding a word in her vocabulary, which Soul knew to be extensive. "Get in the way of doing any real work to find who the killer is! He's looking under every rock to find some clue or another that you killed all those people, instead of being, of being objective and looking at the facts!"

Soul thought, rather to himself than daring to think it aloud that Sheriff Albarn was not alone in having a biased approach to the investigation of this case. He didn't say it to her though, because Miss Albarn's bias was on his side as opposed to the side that would see him hanged. And he while would prefer not be hanged, he also made the very compelling argument - to himself - _that he hadn't killed anyone._

Also it appeared that a demonic creature of shadows and darkness had committed the murders, so he was acutely aware that the only thing that would clear his name was if the creature decided to murder someone else while he was in here.

He wasn't proud of it.

* * *

 **Don't forget to leave a review!**


	4. Chapter Four

**CHAPTER FOUR.**

 **(The Story Really Gets Going.)**

* * *

The creature visited him again on the second night he was there, looming over him as he slept. The sudden chill woke him, and he panicked, falling off the bench and his heart raced as he scrabbled to hold the golden coin to his eye to see his demise. It was undignified.

They stood over him torn between fascination and horror at him. They didn't know how to deal with this, but seemed to like that someone could see and hear it. Soul got the sudden feeling they would've killed him already if they had wanted to. He didn't particularly enjoy the feeling but it wasbetter than the feeling of great peril he had felt the previous night.

Which was great for them and all, but Soul was still on the town's unofficial Death Row.

Soul didn't know what to say to them, so he didn't say anything much at all to begin with. He just listened, and that thing, they did yammer to fill the lulls in conversation. They were not the greatest conversation partner one could hope for, but Soul supposed they were better than nothing.

" _Mother was so very angry."_

"I know what's that like, believe me, " Soul shuddered at the memory of shrieking, white hot anger, tempered only by a bottle of red wine and a mournful tune played by her steadfast son. No, not him, the other one.

" _Frightfully angry,"_ they paused to collect their thoughts." _She doesn't know I'm here."_

"I won't tell her."

" _She thought I should've taken your soul anyway,"_ they said quietly, as though it were ashamed to admit it. " _She didn't think I should've let you get away."_

"It wouldn't have done you any good," Soul tried to reassure the creature. "My soul is still in my chest, but it belongs to someone else."

" _Try telling Mother that."_

If Soul was a gambling man, he'd have put good money down that the high, creaking noise that followed was laughter.

* * *

Unfortunately for Soul, his second day spent behind bars was not nearly so pleasant as the first. This was largely due to the fact the both Sheriff Albarn and Miss Albarn decided to call upon him at the same time, and spent the entire time of their visit arguing with each other while Soul very much endeavoured to seem as small and unobtrusive as possible.

"Maka!" Sheriff Albarn roared. The bars shook, and Soul wondered if it wasn't easier to escape than he'd first thought. "What are you doing here!?"

"I've come to visit my friend," Maka said, and smiled quickly as Soul who looked over his shoulder in the vain hopes she would pretend she was here to see someone else. "He's been wrongfully imprisoned by some ne'er-do-well impersonating a Sheriff."

Sheriff Albarn spluttered incoherently, and Soul had to stop himself from laughing at his expression - it would not do well, as a man in the jailhouse, to antagonise the jailer.

"Your friend -" Sheriff Albarn gestured in through the bars of the cell at Soul, who ducked out of the way. "- is a coldhearted killer!"

Untrue, but Soul had no way of proving that.

"And he scratched up my nice floor!"

Again, untrue, and Soul could prove that at least, although he figured it was better to be quiet than draw anymore attention to himself.

"You can't prove that!"

"Who else was it then!?"

Just, you know, a demon creature that came to murder him in the night and steal his soul only to find that his soul was already under contract to another demon. If Soul had to bet on which he thought would win in a fight, he'd pick the one who came a calling last night. The demon to whom he owed a significant debt had been well spoken and finely dressed, with eyes that burned like coal embers in his sockets, charring the flesh around them. Despite that, he was fine boned and thin, constantly wiping his hands on his spotless handkerchief to clean them after he touched anything.

You never could tell with demons though.

"Well, it wasn't Mr. Eater!" Miss Albarn insisted. "I can tell. Oh, by the way, Mr. Eater, Falada positively wolfed down the oats with the beer poured over -"

"That's what you took my Westvleteren for!" The Sheriff was quaking, and Soul winced in sympathy. "For some demonic horse!?"

Soul was torn between his impulse to defend Falada and his self preservation instinct.

Self preservation won out - Falada could look after herself and the beer was already gone.

* * *

On the third night, Soul had grown accustomed to the presence of the creature. It arrived like it had the previous night - suddenly and with no respect for a man who might like to spend his nights asleep, as many a man did. It startled him once again, but not so badly as to make him fall out off of his bench this time.

"Jesus!" Soul swore. He stretched and yawned widely before looking through the coin to see them. "Warn a fella, will ya?"

" _Sorry, I'm so sorry, please I'm- "_ the creature flinched away, pitiful and fearful.

"No, no," Soul said, soothingly, his hands raised. "Don't you get into a knot over it, you startled me is all."

They nodded, and perked up a little when Soul smiled, his sharp teeth delighting the creature.

They really did seem to be growing fond of him, or at least hungry for some manner of attention. They could be quite childlike at times, sitting obediently and babbling, or they could be anxious, riddled with nervous energy and shuddering and shaking whenever Soul broached a topic with which the creature was unfamiliar, or upon which it felt it should not speak.

" _My blood is black."_

"Right, you said that already."

" _Wanna see?"_

"No! Why would I want to see-"

They lifted their heavy blade like it was almost nothing, and slashed quickly across their opposite hand. The blood that leaked out, heavy and vicious like tar was so black as to appear non-existant, a flat plane like someone had carved a hole out of the universe.

"Holy - "

" _I can make it dance,"_ they said, and the blood moved, undulating unnaturally and forming sharp peaks suddenly before moving in gentle waves again. They turned their head thoughtfully, and the blood splattered to the ground as they lost concentration, focused on some new idea. " _What colour is your blood?"_

"It's red," Soul said promptly.

" _May I see?"_

"Maybe some other time," Soul tried not to look too nervous when he folded his arms, tucking his hands into his armpits, out of reach. Of course, the creature could take them if they wanted - like most things, they were a good deal stronger than Soul was and he could not forget whatever magic had made him move when he had not wished to.

Soul and the creature talked for a long time, about a lot of things. The creature stayed until the dawn light broke through the window, and then it left Soul alone again. He slept in as late as he could, and when he woke, he realised something.

They spoke only in the high thin voice the whole night and the deeper gravellier voice made no appearance. Soul made the decision not to think about that too much.

* * *

Soul had been in jail longer than he liked, and was more than eager for someone, ideally Miss Albarn, to prove his innocence. To be fair, it was his humble opinion that one day in jail was one day too many to be spending in jail. The longer he was in here, and longer his Visitor went without murdering anyone, the less chance he had of getting out of this alive.

And his chances were already pretty slim to begin with.

He really should stop hoping that someone died to prove his innocence - that was the sort of thing that had a tendency to backfire spectacularly. He was whistling, trying to conjure a tune from thin air, his hand dancing over a piano that was not really there.

He was so wrapped up in the song only he could hear the true sound of that he did not hear the great commotion - and by the Lord's above, it was great, yelling and gunfire and the bellow of beasts - outside until Miss Albarn came sprinting into the jailhouse. She ran past him to the desk, pulling open drawers and piling loose bullets and scraps of paper onto the tabletop.

"Miss Albarn!" His hands dropped through the imaginary piano, and the cell was flooded with noise from outside. How had he possibly missed it before now? It was deafening.

"There you are!" Miss Albarn said to herself, her father's keys rattling in her hand. She looked thoughtfully back at the upheaval of her father's meticulous filing system and reached over, grabbing a large handful of the loose bullets and wrapping them in a handkerchief before depositing them into her pocket.

"Miss Albarn," Soul repeated, thoroughly confused by the whole situation and not sensing an explanation forthcoming. "What in the devil is going on?"

She barked out a short laugh.

"Miss Albarn?"

"Oh for heaven's sake," Miss Albarn muttered, flipping through the selection of keys hurriedly. "Call me Maka - I think breaking you out of jail might put us on a first name basis."

"Breaking me out of - Miss Albarn - "

"Maka," she corrected, easily, trying a key and cursing when it stuck in the lock. She battled with it for a moment before pulling it free and trying a second key.

"Maka," he conceded, he liked the sound of it in his mouth "Maka, what on earth is happening? Why are you breaking me out? Did he get the warrant to kill me?"

She fumbled with the lock, and Soul hear a click, audible even with all the noise.

"What?" Maka siad, hauling the door open. "No, no, you're free to go."

"Really?"

"No, not really, but someone else did just admit murdering everyone and we are in desperate need of your unique skills at this minute," She motioned for him to leave the cell. "Hurry up, we haven't got all day."

"How did you -"

"This is Death, Soul, trust me when I tell you that you are the tip of the iceberg," She reached in and grabbed his arm in a very familiar way, dragging him out of the confines of the cell. Soul shook himself out of her grasp.

"Maka, what on Earth is going on?"

"Just - we need to get Falada," she said. "Oh no."

The town was deadly silent, all noise from before was gone.

She left the keys in the lock.

* * *

The Jailhouse was not very far from where Falada was stabled, but the journey had never looked like this before. The Main Street was pocked with craters, starbursts of black ash marring the road. The store fronts where freckled with bullet holes and there was a horse dead in the street.

Figured that everything would have happened while he was in jail.

Liz was laid behind the dead horse, bracing a rifle across its belly. Her sharp eyes were scanning the road, and Soul could feel the hairs raise on the back of his neck when she locked eyes with him and nodded. Her fashionable - or as fashionable as it got out here, several years behind the fashions of the East coast - her scarlet dress was fanned out, a dangerously bright streak of colour in an otherwise bleak view.

"Go," Maka said quietly, "Liz'n'Patti'll cover us."

"Patti?"

As if she could hear him, Patti drew his attention by waving a silk ribbon - a deep blue one, one of her very favourites. She was perched like a bird on the rooftop of the saloon, her keen eye watching over everything she saw. He hoped she was as good a shot as her grimly focused sister, but her joyful expression made him doubt it. Still, hesupposed it was better than nothing.

The fight, or whatever it was had stilled for now, but Soul anticipated that it would start again soon. There was no sense in not being cautious.

Soul and Maka moved along the street, sticking closely to the walls of the buildings until they drew level with the saloon, before darting across the wide empty street to the swinging doors.

The three old crones were moved, Soul guessed somewhat reluctantly from the tabletop to the floor, playing their interminable card game on the floor out of view of the the windows.

"Thanks for the coin," Soul said. "Came in real useful."

As if on cue, all three of them looked up at him, and said in unison, almost in one voice.

"It was a gift, and we do not give useless gifts."

He nodded, and glanced down at the card game.

"Na is cheating, by the way."

Ma and Ta both turned to look at their sister, who shrieked in protest.

"Soul, come on, we don't have time - "

Patti appeared at the top of the stairs, replesendant in her finest dress. She spun to show it off, delighted to be seen it in, despite the dust that was already coating it. Her rifle was slung over her shoulder, and her favourite blue ribbon was wrapped around her hand and wrist.

This was a weird day, and Soul had had some memorable ones in his time. Maka reached into her pocket and pulled out the fistful of bullets, tossing the bundle to Patti who caught it with ease and laughed when she felt the contents.

"Miss Maka!" She said. "You're far too good to me!"

"Keep up the good work, Patti," Soul said, at a loss for anything else to say.

"We need to go," Maka said, tugging on his arm.

"Right, see you Patti," Soul followed Maka out, looking over his shoulder and frowning as Patti saluted him. That was decidedly odd.

Soul rushed to meet Falada, who was straining that the rope someone had used to tie her to an iron hook in the wall.

"Hey girl," he said quietly. "I missed you."

Falada pulled at the rope, rubbing her nose all over Soul's face and hair. It seemed as though she had missed him too.

"Heard you gave Miss Albarn awful trouble."

Falada whinnied as if to refute this slander of her character. Soul moved quickly to untie the rope, but Falada was much more at ease now that he was in her field of vision. Maka smiled at Falada from a comfortable distance and the horse snorted at her.

It was a step up from trying to eat her.

"Alright, Maka," Soul said, saddling up Falada and inspecting her for any harm that may have come to her in the three days since he had last laid eyes on her. There was none, for which Sheriff Albarn better be grateful otherwise he had been in a whole lot of trouble. "What's next?"

"What do you mean what's next?" Maka said, "Ride in on your demonic horse and vanquish the villain."

"What?" Soul said, dropping the reins in surprise. "How do you propose I do that?"

"I don't know," Maka said. "You're the one with all the… you know... " she gestured vaguely while she searched for the word, " _Gifts."_

"Gifts?"

"Well," she said, holding the door open so that he could lead Falada outside. "You know, you have the coins and the horse and something really weird about your soul."

"I sold it."

" _You sold it!?"_

"Traded, really," he tried to explain, although it was not a very good explanation. "So I could play the piano."

"You… you traded your soul," Maka said slowly. "To play the piano."

"I'm really good at the piano, Maka."

"Okay, well what about the coins?" She said, changing the subject quickly.

"Well, this one was from Ta, and it allows me to see the demon creature that killed everyone," Soul held up the old gold coin to his eye, looking at her though it. "They've been coming to visit me in jail. Tried to murder me."

Maka sort of shimmered through the lens of the coin, as if there was a light inside her that shone outwards. He couldn't read her expression through all the light. She was hard to look at, so he dropped the coin. It clinked against the others when it fell.

"And the other ones?"

"Those just look cool," Soul said, tugging on the cord so they jingled.

"Falada!?"

"She's just a horse," Soul said, shrugging. "I don't know what to tell you."

"But who else - it has to be you," Maka said, tugging at the ends of her hair. "Who else could it be? Who else is going to save us?"

"Can't it be you?"

"Nice try, but that's not how these things work," Maka huffed. "I see the truth of things, people like me normally just, you know, get our warnings ignored while everyone dies."

Soul mounted Falada, swinging his leg over the saddle easily. He held out his hand to Maka.

"Get on the horse."

* * *

 **I appreciate any feedback I can get, as I was trying something new with this fic.**


	5. Chapter Five

**CHAPTER FIVE.**

 **(The Story Reaches A Climax.)**

* * *

Riding Falada one handed was tricky, in part because she had a tendancy to want to go her own way without firm encourageent, but Soul needed to hold the coin up to his eye in order to see everything that was happening. And what it was that was happening had the appearance of being not a whole lot, the town still hovering in stillness, all energies focused on the church. The calm before the storm, or the break in the battle.

The whole town was holding its breath, teetering on the edge of a precipice.

Soul could see a flash of the Sheriff's red hair from atop Falada. He was perched on top of the victualler's store and he did not look happy to see Maka sitting behind Soul in Falada's saddle. His gun was trained on the church, but Soul suspected that he was fighting the temptation to shoot at Soul. Soul would've tipped his hat to show his appreciation, but he didn't have any free hands.

First they came upon Liz, who was still taking cover behind the dead horse. Falada seemed unconcerned by the death of one of her species, which normally Soul might note as cause for concern, but this time he was just glad she didn't try to fight it. He brought Falada to a stop and looked down at her.

She was lying in a pool of blood.

Soul would've said that it was probably the horses blood it wasn't for the six, no seven bullet holes he could see in her back. They were all exit wounds, the flesh folding outwards. At least the bloodstains weren't quite as visible in the red satin of the dress, because there was no way those were coming out, even if she did manage to mend the holes. The boning of her bodice was damaged, twsted and burned by the heat of the bullets. Soul fought the urge to vomit, suspecting that it might be considered rude. But still, he felt himself pale at the sight.

"Rough day?" Soul asked.

"It's not so bad."

"Can I ask - ?"

"Demon sisters, doomed to wander this earth, undying, with no allies but the shadow of Death," Liz intoned, without looking up. She was focused almost completely on the church. "That old witch was a fool if she thought that would be a curse. Best thing that ever happened to me, really. And that bitch is rotting in hell for it too."

"Seems as though you managed to find yourself a loophole alright," Soul nodded. This must have been what Maka meant when she called him the tip of the iceberg.

"Y'all going to the church?"

"Yes ma'am," Soul said. He looked at the church, cream coloured and unassuming. "If I die, feel free to ransack my body and take all my earthly possessions."

"I'll hold you to that," Liz said, smiling faintly. "I'd go with you, but-"

"Patti told me once that she couldn't step on holy ground because she was a filthy heretic," Soul remembered. "You got some kid of similar condition?"

"Yeah, something like that."

"Make sure you buy her something nice once you're done looting my body," Soul swallowed. "She was good to me when I showed up first."

"I will, but you needn't worry. Patti's togher than she looks. She'll get over you quickly," she said, then squinted down the length of the gun. "You should hurry up, I don't know how much longer the Good Father and our Kiddo can keep her at bay."

* * *

In an ideal world, Soul would have preffered to have Falada kick down the door and ride right into the church. On his high horse as it were. In this world, the door was not tall enough for them to enter without having to duck their heads, and so instead, Soul dismounted. He paated Falada on her side to thank her for carrying the two ofthem this far, even if they hadn't been able to make a grand and impressive enterance. He helped Maka down from Falada, holding out his hand for her to take as she climbed down. Maka seemed reluctant to accept his help at the same time as being reluctant to attempt to get off of Falada singlehandedly.

Then they hauled open the door - another reason not to kick down the door, it was a much easier feat to kick down a door if it happened to open in the same direction as you were kicking, and it would be a terrible job to replace it - and stepped inside as a trio.

Sitting in the back pew, conversing easily over tea, was Father Death and a woman that Soul did not have cause to recognise. Through the lens of the golden coin he could see that Father Death was, well. He was the Grim Reaper, shrouded in black cloth and with a grinning skull for a head, his skeletal hand wrapped around the handle of a teacup. Soul felt like he should've figured this out earlier. The woman was wrapped in snakes, coiling and writhing around her. It was almost like they were strangling her, squeezing the life out of her, and she did not seem to pay them any mind at all.

"Maka Albarn!" Father Dead stood to welcome them, as though they were merely late comers to afternoon tea. An afternoon tea that was being served by Kidd, from a wel fashioned teacart. Kidd held up the teapot as if to offer them each a cup, he looked much the same as he always did, to Soul's immense relief. "And Mr. Eater!"

"Hello Father," Maka said, and then, "No tea for me, Kidd."

"No, thank you Kidd," Soul held up his hand to stop Kidd from pouring him a cup, even though he really would've have liked some tea in this trying time.

"Mr. Eater," it wasdifficult to look at Father Death, especially now that he was a skeleton. "I was saddened to hear about your stint in the jailhouse, but I am delighted to announce that you have been exonerated of this particular crime."

"Yes," said the woman, taking a leisurely sip of her tea. "What a terrible misunderstanding. I was just telling the Good Father who really killed those people. All my fault really, that you were imprisoned for so long. I should have come forward with what I knew sooner."

"Maka, who, may I ask, is that?" Soul whispered quietly. "We haven't been introduced."

"That's Medusa," Maka whispered. "She worked as Stein's nurse. Really nice woman."

"Yes, I was the one who killed all those people," She laughed coyly, leaning back in her seat. She tossed her blonde hair and smiled dazzlingly.

"You're right, she seems lovely," Soul said under his breath to Maka. Aloud, for everyone to hear, he said something very damning indeed. "No, you didn't. I know who really killed everyone."

"Really." Medusa's smile turned brittle and her teaspoon clinked against the wall of her teacup. "Who, pray tell, do you think killed all of those people of it wasnt me? Don't be chivalrous and claim them. I doubt anyone would believe you."

"They're a demon of some sort, very shy," Soul grinned, showing all his sharp, sharp teeth in an attempt to intimidate Medusa. He doubted that it was working. "Black blood? Ring any bells?"

"I knew I should've insisted Chrona kill you," she closed her eyes for second. She set her teacup back on the cart, and Father Death followed suit. "No matter, it's served its purpose. It's succeeded in making a final sacrifice. I think it's that obnoxious boy from the General Store - well I hope so."

"Ox?" Maka asked. "You killed Ox?"

Kidd took this oppurtunity to roll the tea chart outside, where it ould be out of harm's way when harm did inevitably come to pass.

"Well, as Soul so astutely pointed out, Chrona is the one doing the actual killing," Medusa said, smiling again as she turned her ands outwards. "But Chrona's just a weapon, and I am the one that wields that weapon."

"Where is he?" Maka said. "Where's Ox?"

"That hardly matters, now. You're all going to die." Medusa said, and laughed again, easy and relaxed.

"Why is everything happening somewhere else?" Soul asked, feeling somewhat behind everyone else in comprehending what was happening. "Does anyone know what is going on? I feel like anytime something happens in this town I show up just a little too late."

"Be careful what you wish for, Ifan," said Father Death.

The ground shook.

"It was a pentacle, Soul." Maka said frantically, the thoughthving just occured to her. "That's why there had tobe five. I should've realised. It looked like a trapezoid when I mapped it out. She was just distracting us!"

Medus made a graceful ' _who, me?'_ gesture, which, much to her annoyance, everyone ignored.

"There was only four of them dead until just now," Kidd injected. "Anyone could've made that mistake."

"What is happening right now?" Soul said, mostly to himself, but also in part to Falada, who looked as though she was spoiling for a fight. Admittedly, she loooked like that more often than not. "Hey girl, you're alright Falada, everything's going to be - "

The ground opened just in front of the altar, the stone floor of the church cracking apart as the whole building shook. Soul placed a hand on Falada's flank to steady her emotionally and himself physically. He glanced over at the piano, the nice one, in the corner. It rang with one long discordant note as the bulding shook.

And then something burst forth from the crack in the church floor, sa being with the approximate shape of a man, as if it had never seen one, but perhaps had had one described to it a very long time ago. It was wrapped in thick bands of skin like bandages and Soul felt an enormous pressure on his body, like the air was weighing down on him from all sides. It made Soul want to drop the golden coin, but instead he pressed it further into his eye, until it hurt just touch.

"Fine," he choked out.

Medusa threw back her head and laughed and laughed, like this was all turning out exactly as she planned it. Her laugh echoed in the church, and as it did, Falada reached over and in one swift movement, accompanied by a sickening tearing sound, ripped out Medusa's throat. Her laugh was still in the air, hanging for a minute, twined with the discordant song of the piano.

Three things happened then.

Soul threw up, vomit splattering on the church floor.

Blood sprayed from Medusa, as she took gasping, gurgling breathes and clawed at her throat.

Falada ate the chunk of flesh, appearing to be quite pleased with herself.

Soul took great heaving breaths, looking up at Maka to see her staring being emerging from the crack in front of the altar. there was blood on her face and clothes, and Soul didn't want to think about the blood that was him, otherwise he had no doubt he would throw up again.

"That looks sort of like you, Kidd."

"That's because it's my brother," Kidd replied, matter of factly. "I got the looks and the brains, and he got bloodlust and insanity. Unfortunate, but thats how it happens sometimes,"

Maybe Soul had been rather hard onhis brother growing up. His brother had never wrapped himself in a bizarre skin outfit and burst through the floor of a church.

"The prodigal son has returned!" Father Death exclaimed. "Home again at last, Asura?"

"The prodigal son is the younger son in the story, Father," Kidd said.

"You always did get bogged down in the details Kiddo."

Holy - that thing could talk. And apparently it was Kidd's big brother. Medusa gurgled her last and slumped over in the pew, without anyone much paying her any attention while she died, untidy and undiginified, overshadowed by the reselution of all he murderous plotting. Falada wandered over, uncaring of her imminent demise if it meant that she got to eat more human flesh. Soul didn't think it was wise to get between Falada and a meal, but he knew that she'd be sick as anything tomorrow. Horses were not meant to eat meat.

That was a problem for tomorrow, which, silver lining, he might not even be alive to see.

Soul decided to do the only thing he knew, the thing he had traded his soul for eleven years or so ago, and walked over to the piano and started playing.

The piano in the saloon might be crotchety old lady who was mistrustful, but this gal was a lady who demanded to be treated right before she might let the pure sound ring. She was sleek and well polished, and tuned to perfection, the notes ringing true through the church. He pushed the stool out of the way, cracked his knuckles and his fingers started to dance, violently pounding the keys at times, and at others caressing them like a lover.

The music was like a cacophonous roar.

Soul was unaware of anything that happened for a while after that. For one, he was fully absorbed in pouring his heart out in the from of song, and for another, the piano was facing the wrong way. The final piece of the puzzle to Soul's complete ignorance to everything happening around him was that he required two hands to play the piano, and he couldn't look through the golden coin while doing so.

But eventually, and insidious whisper reached his ears, a very familiar insidious whisper.

" _Where's Mother?"_

"Where's, where's your mother," Soul asked, his fingers stumbling a little as he thought. "Blonde lady, very evil, intent causing the end of the world?"

"y _es."_

"My horse killed her," Soul thought for a second longer, and remembered that he didn't have much to lose at this point. "And started eating her."

" _Oh, she wasn't very nice was she?"_ the demon creature, Chrona, asked. Soul felt ashamed for not thinking to ask them their name before this. He supposed he that had assumed they didn't have one.

"Not particularly, no," Soul said, his hands stretching to new rhythm while he talked."She did want to kill us all, I think."

" _I don't want you to die."_

"That's very - that's so sweet of you," Soul said, genuinely touched. "I'd prefer not to die,"

" _Really?"_ Chrona said, as if the idea of someone not wanted to die was very surprising to them.

"Well, I'd rather if no one died, Chrona."

But they were already gone, and Soul found himself pulled into the song again, his hands moving,dancing leaping and darting, and his body tense, coiled like a spring. Every thing he was, was being put into the song, and he felt himself searching deeper, looking harder for reserves of energy inside himself. He was being drained, weaving parts of himself wholly into the song, vanishing so completely into the music that it was all he was, until he was filling the whole space up with himself, his being bouncing into every corner of the building, spreading and resonating until the whole building quivered with his life and his signed away soul.

The church was turning dark around him, a blackness spreading through the church like ink in water, filling and coating everything, wrapping up his heart and his soul and everything he was until it was all there was and he looked down at his hands, still dancing, still darting over the keys.

And then all was black, a darkness so impenetrable Soul was sure he'd gone blind, but as long as he had his ears still, and as long as he held the image of the piano in his head, knowing that Maka believed in him to do something to save this town, even if all he could do was make bad deals and play the piano, he could still play.

He closed his eyes and it made no difference, his song and his soul still ringing in the darkness.

His heart ached, and he felt empty, but he couldn't possibly be, because still he played, and he played until the song ended, as all songs, did.

And he opened his eyes, turning to look at the others, with the ambitious plan of finding a stick to hit the creature that had crawled out of the ground with.

There was nothing but black, the floor, the walls, the altar, the pew - everything coated in a deep impermeable black. He was panting, out of breath as his eyes adjusted to the scene.

Maka, Kidd, and Father Death were standing in the middle of the aisle, looking terribly confused, which was how Soul felt. He could hear Falada snuffling over to his right, and when he chanced a glance in her direction her was relieved to see that she was not eating the carcass of Medusa. He didn't know where Medusa's body had vanished to, but it was gone, and there was hardly a trace of it, if not for the blood that stained Falada's mouth. She looked a little disappointed as she snuffled at the space the body had been, looking for more tasty human meat.

"What happened?" Soul asked.

"I'm going to have a tough time explaining this one to the bishop," Father Death said, looking around at his all new black church. Soul realised that he wasn't looking through the coin, and that probably meant that just about anyone could see the church's new look.

"We were fighting," Maka said, "And your song was making ring and Asura was shrieking then-"

"Everything just went dark," Kidd said, frowning as he tried to puzzle it out."I thought perhaps I was dead. "

"It was a great deal like being dead," Father Death agreed. "At least, from my experience."

"And everything was black, and Asura and Medusa were both gone," Kidd said.

"Not everything," said Maka, walking over to Soul. She nodded over his shoulder. "Look."

The lovely piano in the corner of the room had turned almost entirely black with the exception of the ebony keys, which had turned a dazzling white.

"The tea chart! Kidd exclaimed, darting outside to see that it had survived. "The outisde is black aswell!"

"Are you okay?" Maka asked Soul. She was bruised and battered, a narrow cut across her cheek leaking blood. She looked much worse than he felt, and he wondered what exactly happened while his back had been turned.

"I guess my hands hurt a little?"

Maka laughed, and Soul felt all the empty, drained places in him start to fill up again.

* * *

 **I may have googled some things. A lot of things.**

 **That brings us to the conclusion of this years resbang! Please leave a review if you have any questions or anything to say at all. I'm so tired. This fc was 8000 words yesterday. Do not write half your resbang in 36 hours.**


End file.
